This year, according to data analyzed by Nielsen SoundScan, in the United States over the Internet was sold 1.01 billion songs, which is a decrease of 4% compared to the 2012. The total number of downloads of digital music content decreased by 1%, while the number of downloads of digital albums grow by 2% compared to last year.

Microsoft is an interesting company. Over the years they have built more than a few very solid products (including operating systems), but because of a lack of real leadership and marketing ability many of these products have remained in the shadows. One of these has been the Zune music service Zune Pass. This service was put into competition with Apple’s iTunes at the height of Apple’s power and consumer influence. Microsoft updated the service when they launched the ill-fated Zune HD that allowed for unlimited downloads and streaming with a simple monthly fee and still failed to get the service to take off.

Apple is preparing to compete head-to-head with Pandora and other companies that offer Internet radio services, sources have said. The time frame for this is the beginning of next year. Apple could close deals with major music labels by mid-November and after that they won’t need them much to launch their own streaming radio service. They will probably use a smart radio model like Pandora and avoid the expensive on-demand model that is used by Spotify. Ads will be also there (Apple’s iAds), but it is still unknown how revenues be split between the Apple and the music labels.

Microsoft has “discovered” that users today that typically need to use multiple services to get all they want. They often will use one for buying and downloading music and another one for streaming. Because of this, Microsoft has decided to offer their solution. The Xbox Music “all-in-one” music service allows its users to stream music free of charge, unlimited for first six months and after that up to 10 hours monthly, with an unlimited streaming option if they pay a subscription or buy and download desired songs.

Despite Nokia's failure with Ovi Music Unlimited they have decided to give their music streaming aspirations a second chance, so Lumia users will be able to listen streaming music for free. The service was available in Europe since last year and now it will be available in US too. The music service will be completely ad-free, and music will be picked and kept up to date by an expert team of US musicologists. It will offer 150 exclusive playlists so everyone will find something they like. This announcement comes days before they will have news event with Microsoft in which they are expected to launch one or more WP8 smartphones.